Plays and puppets are an excellent way to get children in Israel – both Arabs and Jews – to interact in English, as Charles Goodger discovers

Of all the countries I have lived and worked in during my 30 odd years in EFL, Israel is the most fascinating and diverse.

Opportunities to teach English are limited, as there are many Jewish mother-tongue English teachers from English-speaking countries eager to spend time in Israel. I found plenty of other possibilities.

When my wife was asked to teach Italian at Tel Aviv University, I took extended leave from my post at Bologna University to join her. As well as teaching, I write packages of language-learning action songs that schools and teachers can download from the website and YouTube.

I also stage bilingual puppet shows and action song workshops which combine entertainment, collective learning and interaction. Performed well, these “FunSongs Shows” can be highly effective. Kids learn while having fun and expressing themselves through music and mime, rhythm and rhyme.

My first break

One of my first EFL opportunities in Israel arose from a conversation at a party at the Hebrew-Arabic Al Saraya Theatre in Jaffa, just outside Tel Aviv. Located in what was once an ancient tannery, the theatre is well known for putting on first-rate plays in Hebrew, Arabic and English.

After talking to the Director for Arabic productions, Mahomet Kundos, we agreed to work on an Arabic-English version of the FunSongs Puppets and Monster Show for local primary schools.

Until that point these workshops had been only been performed in Italy, and more recently in Latvia, where I had lived for five years. This new adaptation involved translating the Latvian parts of the script into Arabic while the English stayed as it was. On Mahomet’s advice, I also made some cultural adjustments to the original songs and puppet scripts.

The show was a great success and brought me to the attention of the Israeli Ministry of Education, which was launching the “Let’s Talk” project for Junior High schools.

Nationwide

“Let’s Talk” is a nationwide program for schools, set up to stimulate English conversation and interaction. Funded by the Ministry, the US Embassy and a nondenominational educational foundation called AMAL, schools across Israel, including those in Arabic-speaking villages, can choose from a series of freely-provided one-hour workshops.

In February last year I was asked by the Chief Schools Inspector of English Studies at the Israeli Ministry of Education to meet up with Dafna Hillel, an events organiser recruited to coordinate the program.

I managed to convince them that a workshop based on teaching the action song “The Monster March” (it teaches 14 parts of the body) was a good idea. Abraham Goldstein, a talented Israeli- American actor and teacher I’d been introduced to in Tel Aviv has been staging Monster March workshops in both Hebrew and Arabic schools for almost a year now. The feedback has been great. “The Monster March activity is very playful,’ one teacher wrote. “The actor, Abraham… managed to get all my students on their feet and singing in English.”

Another contact at the Hebrew Arabic theatre led to my third project with a language school in Nazareth – a fascinating city that welcomes thousands of Christian tourists from all over the world every year.

The Kamal-I school purchased an exclusive licence to use all my action songs and study material and stage Fun Songs shows at the theatre in Nazareth, and in September I spent a busy week teacher-training to help familiarise teachers with the method.

Personal impressions

My EFL projects bring me back to Israel regularly and I enjoy the wonderful climate, marvellous food and friendly people – yet I can’t help wondering at the contradictions that beset this part of the world.

When I first told friends and family I’d be moving to Israel for a few months, the usual comment was “But isn’t it dangerous?”

In the summer of 2014 I saw tourism evaporate overnight after the tragic and bloody Gaza war that July. And I remember a missile (rendered harmless by the Tel Aviv anti-ballistic system) fired from Gaza clattering down into the courtyard of our apartment building in Jaffa. This was the one time I felt in danger.

I myself always tend to tread carefully when the question of Israel and Palestine comes up as so many people (who often know nothing about the reality of life there) have very strong views.

I have come to admire the attitude of the Arab Israelis with whom I have worked. They never discuss politics and just get on with their lives, though I do sense a deep-rooted sense of grief.

I also have great admiration for the Jews, who have succeeded in creating such a prosperous land.

I admire rather less – my own business interests notwithstanding – an educational policy which invests so assiduously in teaching children English and Hebrew, but not Arabic.